Among the Brave
0Loading crowd target
0Loading crowd target
7correct to beat the crowd
40 free Among the Brave trivia questions with answers — literature quiz, new questions added Oct 2026.
Among the Brave hands the Shadow Children story to its most unlikely hero. Trey is the boy who would rather hide than fight, yet when his friends vanish and the Population Police take over the country, he is the only one left to act. Margaret Peterson Haddix turns that reluctance into the engine of the book. This quiz follows the novel from the opening raid on Mr. Talbot's house through the night drive with Luke's brother Mark, the infiltration of Population Police headquarters and the prison rescue, and on to the choice Trey makes about the documents he has carried all along. A few questions step back to the wider series and its author. It is written for readers who have just finished the book, for classes and book clubs working through it, and for anyone revisiting the series. Every answer comes with a short explanation, so a wrong guess still teaches something.
30 of 40 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01During the raid on Mr. Talbot's house in Among the Brave, what does Trey dive behind on the porch?
A flowerpot
A flowerpot is all that hides Trey from the Population Police, yet the raider who searches the porch reports it clear.
Q 02Which Latin word, used as a code by Mr. Talbot's resistance, does a raider say on the porch in Among the Brave?
Liber
Liber means free, and when Mark later yells it from captivity, it draws out a guard who secretly shares the cause.
Q 03After Mark is captured in Among the Brave, how does Trey get inside Population Police headquarters himself?
He enlists as a recruit
He enlists as a recruit among hundreds of men and boys rushing to join, then uses his new position to search the building for Mark.
Q 04In Among the Brave, what is Mark locked inside when Trey finds him at Population Police headquarters?
A cage
A cage holds Mark in the basement, where the prisoner is due to be disposed of within a few hours.
Q 05At the end of Among the Brave, what do Mr. Talbot and the others first decide to do with Trey's documents?
Burn them
Burn them is the adults' plan for keeping the pages from the Population Police, but Trey snatches them back at the last moment.
Q 06In Among the Brave, what does Trey keep calling himself in his own thoughts?
A coward
A coward is how Trey sees himself, yet Mark, Luke's older brother, tells him he is the braver of the two.
Q 07Which country's real birth-limit policy helped inspire the two-child law in Margaret Peterson Haddix's Among the Brave?
China
China and its one-child policy came up when Haddix and her husband debated whether to have more than two children themselves.
Q 08In Among the Brave, what injures Mark as he tries to slip onto the grounds of Population Police headquarters?
An electrified fence
An electrified fence throws Mark into spasms, and Trey has to shove him off with a stick before four uniformed men take him away.
Q 09In Among the Brave, what profession lets Mrs. Talbot treat the injured after the prison rescue?
A doctor
A doctor by training, Mrs. Talbot abandons Trey in her own house early on, then reappears to tend the rescued group.
Q 10In Among the Brave, what does Trey hand over to have the captive Mark moved out of headquarters?
Forged papers
Forged papers ordering a transfer to another prison get Mark onto the pickup, and neither officer on duty is willing to phone and check.
Q 11In Among the Brave, what habit from Trey's years in hiding gives him the knowledge that saves his life?
Reading books
Reading books his father supplied left Trey timid but learned, and in moments of danger he calms himself by recalling word origins.
Q 12Where does Among the Brave fall in Margaret Peterson Haddix's seven-book Shadow Children series?
Fifth
Fifth in the sequence, it is the only Shadow Children book told from Trey's point of view rather than Luke Garner's or Nina's.
Q 13In Among the Brave, which privileged class gets accurate news that the government keeps from everyone else?
The Barons
The Barons, the country's wealthy elite, control stations of their own, while ordinary families see only what officials allow.
Q 21In Among the Brave, what affectionate name does Mark Garner call the farm truck he and Trey drive?
Bessie
Bessie has to be pushed out of the barn and down to the road before Mark will start the engine, so that nobody hears them leave.
Q 22Which Population Police officer at the prison in Among the Brave secretly helps Trey's group escape?
Nedley
Nedley looks like a loyal officer when the warden sends him off with Mark, but the two use the drive to plan a fake kidnapping.
Q 23Which Population Police commander does Trey overhear raging about a prisoner in the basement in Among the Brave?
Aldous Krakenaur
Aldous Krakenaur has just seized the government, and Trey hears him fume from a hiding place only a grille away.
Q 14In Among the Brave, what must Trey do for a Population Police soldier in exchange for Mark's release?
Free a jailed friend
Free a jailed friend is the bargain, and only after the escape does Trey recognize the battered prisoner as Mr. Talbot himself.
Q 15Under the new regime in Among the Brave, what must a family do before it can legally buy food?
Enroll a relative as an officer
Enroll a relative as an officer or be barred from trading: the rule sends hundreds of men and boys to sign up for a force many of them think is wrong.
Q 16Which orphan raised by a homeless man takes over as hero in the Shadow Children novel after Among the Brave?
Matthias
Matthias leads the next book, which brings back Trey's ally from the prison escape working undercover under a new name.
Q 17In Among the Brave, whose former mansion do Trey and Mark find serving as Population Police headquarters?
The Grants
The Grants had been killed at their own party just before the story opens, and their estate is now the nerve center of the new regime.
Q 18In Among the Brave, how do Trey and Mrs. Talbot find out the Population Police have overthrown the government?
A private news network
A private news network breaks the story, and the defeated Mrs. Talbot walks out of her own home, leaving Trey to fend for himself.
Q 19In Among the Brave, what do the papers Trey carries through the whole story turn out to conceal?
Identities of third children
Identities of third children living under false names fill the pages, which is why Trey cannot bear to see the list destroyed.
Q 20In Among the Brave, what color is the hair of the hostile woman Trey finds inside the Talbot house?
Bright red
Bright red hair marks out the woman who confronts Trey after the raid, and she turns out to be Mrs. Talbot, mother of Luke's dead friend Jen.
Q 24In Among the Brave, what killed Trey's father, the parent who had educated him in hiding?
A heart attack
A heart attack took the one parent who cared for Trey's mind; his mother had spent her evenings glaring at him while he studied.
Q 25In the backstory of Among the Brave, what did Trey's mother do with him once his father had died?
Left him at a school
Left him at a school is the blunt version: she said it was no longer safe for them to be together, and Trey still feels abandoned.
Q 26In Among the Brave, where does Trey hide once Mrs. Talbot leaves him alone in her house?
A kitchen cabinet
A kitchen cabinet is where he curls up: Trey spent his whole childhood shut in one room, and the empty house frightens him.
Q 27On Trey's third day waiting in the Talbot house in Among the Brave, what is cut off across the neighborhood?
The electricity
The electricity goes off after days in which Trey has had no news at all and can only guess how bad things are outside.
Q 28Which board game played with his father does Trey recall while deciding how to save Mark in Among the Brave?
Chess
Chess comes to mind as Trey hides alone outside headquarters, unsure what to do after four uniformed men have taken Mark away.
Q 29Which injury keeps Mark from joining Trey's undercover plan straight away at the end of Among the Brave?
A broken leg
A broken leg, set in a prison infirmary during the rescue, leaves Mark promising to follow the others as soon as he recovers.
Q 30How does Mark stop Population Police trucks from chasing the escaping prisoners in Among the Brave?
He punctures their tires
He punctures their tires so that nobody can follow, a detail Trey only learns once Mark retells the adventure in safety.